“It made sense that TAP was sold to Iberia, despite the … – Expresso

"It made sense that TAP was sold to Iberia, despite the … – Expresso

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It is true that they are working on a project to make transatlantic flights?
Yes, but we must be careful when we talk about it. We have a plan to do so, but only going to do in about ten years. We need long-haul aircraft and availability of routes, which at this point still there.

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Lisbon will be a basis for these connections
Both? Lisbon and Porto may be important points. What we want to do is fly to 15 European cities to about 12 in the United States. Portugal, which is one of our largest markets, has enormous potential to liaise. Furthermore, we use our ‘portfolio’ of passengers and that’s why we need to grow our base in Lisbon

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will be sold, not yet quite know to whom. It made sense to go to the Iberia, although the Portuguese do not like to sell to the Spaniards. However, is what makes most sense, since the Spanish company dominates various destinations in South America

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Once said that passengers not imprinted boarding passes were stupid. Those traveling in the traditional companies are also?
not. Mostly choose these companies because they are not a low cost alternative. If you look at many of the routes from Lisbon, we see that TAP had the monopoly for many years. People never had a choice – we did was give them the opportunity to travel. We’re number one in Porto, number one in Faro. And in the coming years will be the biggest in Lisbon. We can grow a lot more and bring more passengers to Portugal.

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What is your assessment of these ten years in Portugal
? In the first year we had less than 100 000 passengers, we now have six million. In three years we will overcome the TAP. Note, we are larger than Iberia in Spain, we are following the Alitalia in Italy and are the first in the UK. In addition, we have a great determination to grow in the three Portuguese airports.

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Think reach the Azores
We are talking to? the Government and the airport. What is difficult. Nobody seems to know what to do: continue to have links the archipelago state-subsidized or ceases to be so. We plan to be the largest airline operating in Portugal and for that, we need to fly to the Azores and Madeira.

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The future of aviation goes through the low cost airlines?
When you buy a plane ticket, the first thing they think about is the price. 20 years ago, our parents and our grandparents wanted to have a lounge at the airport, a comfortable place. Now, people want to travel fast, spend as little as possible on the flight so they could spend more and spend more time at your destination. We realize that and that’s how you justify that in the last five years have grown from 50 million passengers to 80 million. We are the strongest in Europe

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Lisbon could be a hub
? It would be difficult now. Because there are many nearby hubs – London, Paris and Frankfurt. The way things are going to be hard to make the city one hub. Lisbon has the ability to grow your traffic and it needs to have more low cost airlines, more routes and more flights have. I saw from the beginning that our potential. For ten years I have been with family in Portugal. I was the first to say that we should make a base in Porto, even when no one wanted to even talk to us Lisboa

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What Mário Lino, former Minister of Public Works, said in 2011, in an interview with “Business”, regarding a possible sale of the TAP Iberia